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January 8, 2013

Top Ten Bookish Goals for 2013

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created
by the bloggers of The Broke and the Bookish. Although this week we're supposed
to record our top ten bookish goals, after some consideration I decided that
there are eight main goals that I hope to accomplish.

Read at least 65 books this year: That's my
official Goodreads 2013 Reading Challenge goal. Although, to be honest, I hope
to break 85 books. Last year I ended up reading 65 books with a challenge of 45 books, so I'd like to beat
that number this year!

Complete DAC & SARC challenges: This is my
first year participating in any reading challenges, so I'm super pumped about
these two. Right now my goal is to complete them both with the bare minimum
reading requirements, although it'll be awesome if I can read more for
each.

Intersperse YA books with adult books: Before
2012, I hadn't really read many YA books (except for re-reads) for many years.
During college my time was generally limited and my desire to read books outside
of classes was not always there. I'm so grateful for finding Goodreads and so
many great YA book blogs that have encouraged me to read more and record my
thoughts. I would like, however, to continue reading adult fiction as well.
Chick lit, adult fantasies, science fiction, classics, and more!

Do not get distracted by all the upcoming
releases: I've been pretty good about this so far and I hope to keep it
up. Shiny new books are definitely exciting, but I don't want to ignore
fantastic older books and books that have been on my TBR list for a while simply
because everyone is raving about this new book and I feel like I just have to read it RIGHT
NOW.

Try to do some me writing a couple of days per
week: While book blogging has given me the excuse to read a lot and
write all about my thoughts, I miss writing for me. I love writing and hope to
eventually write something publishable one day. So I need to definitely make
more of a concerted effort on my part.

Keep up with the daily readings from The Intellectual
Devotional: For my birthday last September my grandparents gave me a
copy of The Intellectual Devotional by David S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim. I
love the idea of expanding my knowledge by a little each day, and I don't think
it's much of a commitment to spend five minutes reading and considering it each
night.

Make more of an effort to interact with other bloggers and
authors: I am pretty shy in real life and apparently that translates
just as well in my internet life. Besides commenting on posts, I find it
difficult to engage bloggers and authors in other ways. Definitely something I
need to work on!

Do not be afraid to decide a book is bad, or even to stop
reading it: I've never given a dishonest opinion per se, but I do find
it difficult to be as open as I sometimes want to be. I think there's a way to
graciously explain how/why books just don't work for you as a reader, so I'd
like to figure that out. And perhaps not be as afraid to stop a book if I really
am not liking it. Too many books, not enough time is very true, after all.

Have any similar goals? Let me know what you bookish goals you
resolve to work on in 2013!

Amanda

Amanda loves few things better than sitting down with a cup of tea and a book. She frequently stays up far too late, telling herself she just needs to finish one more page. When she's not wrapped up in the stories of others, Amanda works as a children's librarian in a public library.

These are fantastic goals. Not getting distracted by new releases is a big problem of mine! I also have trouble DNF'ing a book, and would like to start doing more of that too. I don't want to spend my time on something that I'm not enjoying. This is also my first year doing some challenges - I'm doing DAC too. I hope you're able to accomplish these and more.

Thanks, Lauren! I'm so afraid about DNFing a book, but I'm sure I will need to at some point. So it's something I at least want to make sure I realize is a possibility. DAC looks fun. I'll have to see what debut books you plan on reading - suggestions for those books are proving to be a little trickier since they're not yet released. Still need to figure out what I'd like to read!

Since I started reading YA I found it hard to get back to my adult books and a lot of series I started got thrown to the wayside. I hope I can do better at getting back to them and like you, not get distracted by the shiny new books. I want to try to only be distracted by shiny new books by authors I already love, and to continue the series I started. I also want to keep reading at least one indie/self published title a week. Great goals!

I live in a state of "distracted by upcoming releases," but good luck to you in that. I keep acquiring more books, but reading newer ones instead. I'm trying to catch some of my backlist, but there's just so much to read all the time. I need a reading superpower.

haha I feel like every day I'm moving more towards that state. I need to fight it! And a reading superpower would be fantastic. The ability to freeze time while you read or something. Definitely too many books, too little time! Thank you - I'll need some luck, I'm sure! :)